The Wisconsin DNR is calling the Rhinelander-Oneida County Airport a “responsible party” in the contamination of Rhinelander city water wells with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). The DNR cited the airport’s storage and use of fire-fighting foam, which contains PFAS, in its determination. Elevated levels of PFAS, which is linked to health risks like cancer, thyroid disease, and high cholesterol, were found in June in the city’s Well 7, which is located on airport property. “In terms

On Tuesday, high school junior Mariah Freeman watched water drip through a filter she designed and constructed. “We’re going to take the filter we’ve made, and we’re going to pour that water through it, and then retest the water in the new bottle,” Freeman explained. Freeman and her classmates in Cheryl Esslinger’s Earth and Environmental Systems class at Rhinelander High School were simply trying to filter vinegar out of the water and balance its acidity. The students wanted to know whether

Perhaps more than any other fish, northern Wisconsin identifies with the walleye. But walleye populations in many local lakes have been struggling. Some are even at risk of disappearing completely, as the populations are no longer naturally reproducing. Fisheries biologists have had to get creative to try to address the problem, and they’re doing it in different ways in different parts of the Northwoods. The Minocqua chain is a prime example. “The walleye population in the entire chain was very,

In the late 1990s, when Patrick Taylor moved back to his Merrill hometown, he bought a house on the water. It was one of more than a hundred homes on a mill pond created by the old Ward paper mill dam. “It was a great area for duck hunting,” Taylor said. Other people on the water fished, swam, or canoed. Then, Taylor learned the water was about to disappear. “The day after we closed on the house, they announced the removal of the dam,” he said in an interview this week. Twenty years later, the

The DNR admitted putting new rules on PFAS in groundwater, drinking water, and surface water will have a “significant” economic impact on the state. DNR staff also listened to the public, environmentalists, and industry groups at a hearing over a proposed PFAS regulation scope statement last week. Wisconsin is in the early steps of regulating PFAS, a family of chemicals with health hazards. Meghan Williams, an environmental toxicologist with the DNR’s Water Quality Bureau, said PFAS regulation

Once again on Thursday, a Vilas County committee rejected Trig Solberg’s attempt to collect water from a well in Presque Isle for commercial bottling. Over a span of nearly five years, Solberg’s group has been blocked time and again by judges, boards, and administrators. It wants to take water from near rural Carlin Lake, bottle it, and sell it in stores. Solberg is the founder of Trig’s supermarkets. But, by a 4-0 vote, the Vilas County Board of Adjustment rejected the plan. The vote came after

Jim and Ruth Brennan thought the days of iron ore mining in northern Wisconsin were over. So when Gogebic Taconite started drawing up plans about earlier this decade for a massive mine near their home in southern Ashland County, they were surprised, to say the least. “A three- or four-mile ditch that would actually come within about a mile of our house,” said Jim Brennan. Jim and Ruth live in the town of Morse, near Mellen and Copper Falls State Park. Their unique house overlooks Lake Galilee.

Despite ongoing concerns about city drinking water, Rhinelander’s Common Council adopted a Wellhead Protection Plan Monday night without debate or any public comment. In June, the city shut down one of its wells in June after high readings of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), a contaminant and health risk. PFAS levels in that well are now low , but a different form of PFAS in another city well is rising . The second well is still active. On Monday night, the Common Council voted to

Note: This story has been updated from its original version with information about PFHxS studies in animals and humans. This summer, tests showed Rhinelander’s Municipal Well 7 was contaminated with PFAS chemicals. However, the most recent tests show no detection of the two main chemicals in the PFAS family, PFOA and PFOS. Even so, that well remains offline, and is not contributing to the city’s drinking water supply. But a different type of PFAS has been steadily rising in another city well.

Records of water levels on many Northwoods lakes often only go back a few decades, if they exist at all. But one researcher has figured out a way to see the story of lakes going back hundreds of years. That history, and a clue about the future, is as simple as tree rings themselves. “We’re proposing using these trees as an Excel spreadsheet, as a way to get at [the history of] these lake levels,” said Dom Ciruzzi, a UW-Madison graduate student working at Trout Lake Station in Boulder Junction.